A situation may arise where a firefighter may need to make an escape from a burning building or a hazardous area. Different types of personal safety systems are available which allow firefighters to exit the room in a fast & controlled way. DCFD Firefighters are equipped with a personal safety system which includes a 35' personal escape rope, escape eight, two locking carabiners and a Class II harness in their bunker gear. This system enables our firefighters the ability to tie off to an object in the room, exit through the window, and descend to the ground safely.

As part of our annual self-rescue training we held a two part training this year. The first part of the training was classroom based where we discussed safety on the fire ground, bailout techniques and reviewed our rope rescue bags & knots. For the second part of the training we traveled to the Union Training Drill Tower in South Kingstown on Sunday, November 20th. The purpose of this training was a hands-on practical for self rescue bail out.

All firefighters had the chance to practice multiple bailout techniques from the 1st and 2nd floor of the drill tower shown in the pictures below. For additional safety we wore an additional Class III harness attached to a belay system. During the different bailout techniques, we wore our full turnout gear with SCBA (approx 60 ibs) and anchored our life safety rope to a handrail inside of the building or a halligan tool through a subfloor. The following descent techniques were also practiced or demonstrated during training: hand & knot, rescue eight and personal descender w/Crosby Hook.

Thank you to our instructor, Captain Chris Brademeire, for a job well done. We look forward to training with firefighters from the Union Fire District in the future.